'Mad you say?
You say that as if it's a *bad* thing!'
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The whispers started when she stopped coming down for dinner, when she began looking at the people around her as if they were strangers. That her movements were unusual, even for a human member of the X-Men. Most of the time she seemed normal enough, it was only when the nights were drawing in that she began displaying her 'odd' behaviour.
At first they talked among themselves and several friends tried to check up on her in her room, sometimes they found the room empty; other times she was there scribbling frantically in a journal. Her head never raised to see who had disturbed her, she just grunted some words of appeasement and they left her to it. Things only went to the next level when Logan finally came home.
After Alcatraz he'd stayed for a couple of months but the reminders of Jean all around him were too much . That plus the looks of pain that were directed at him, the questions about Xavier's death. It all wound him too tight and so he'd gone back onto the fight circuit for a while. Untying the knots he'd gotten into by beating the blood and guts out of rednecks with more money than sense.
But he came back when the sun began to lower itself into the autumn sky, red and golds littering his path like the wealth he'd earned with his fists. As soon as he was back he noticed the air had changed inside the school an it didn't take long for him to find out who they were all nervous about....Marie.
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Compulsion.
That was what it was, a compulsion.
She HAD to do what she had to do, if it meant writing in German in her journal till her fingers cramped then she did it. If it was finding the weaknesses in the grounds by walking the perimeter before she could finally get some rest she did it. If it was counting the damn jelly beans in the cupboard above the fridge, she did it. She knew her behaviour wasn't right but who could she go to without being treated as a leper? Wouldn't it just make her even more dangerous, Jesus H Christ she was going on missions now! She couldn't let *anyone* know, she had to cope with this on her own and the only way to do that was to do the insane things her mind needed her to do. Only when it was over, could she sleep, only when the task was done did the pressure in her skull cease and her thoughts finally calmed.
She had four thick journals hidden under her bed, each one filled with writing in a different style, only one of which was definately her own. She couldn't go on like this, she knew she would break soon under the pressure so when she heard that Logan had come home her mind had gone to the dark green leather bound journal under her bed. If there was anyone could understand what she'd written in it, he'd be the one. Ducking under her bed her fingers grabbed the journal, determination covering her face, eyes bright with a fevour she didn't recognise as she passed her mirror. There was an answer out there and she needed to find it.
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The room was just as he'd left it, along with the clothes on the floor and the unscrewed toothpaste in the bathroom. He knew he'd told everyone to leave his things alone but he really had thought they might have cleaned up a bit for him. Sighing he dropped his duffle and went into the bathroom, running the shower he heard his door open and shut quickly and something hit the bed. Thinking it was Ororo he poked his head round the door to see who it was, there was no sign of anyone and the old air of the room masked any scent. The only difference was a book on his duffle, taking note of it he got on with his shower. It'd wait until he'd washed the dust from his skin and unpacked, he needed to clean his room too before he'd be comfortable sleeping in it safely. All thoughts about the book left his mind, but when he got round to reading it, it would be all he could think of.
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Dinner was going as well as it could be, well when half of your Beta team wasn't speaking to the other half because of a DR scenario had gone wrong. Leaving one member with a bruise the size of a golf ball just above her temple. The tension had spread across the dining hall and was making the rest of the kids snappy when Logan had just added his own tension to the air by stalking over to Ororo, his face a black cloud and his movements all menace. Dropping her knife and fork she waited for the explosion, the tension racking up in the room as the noise died down. Every head turned toward her table and the huge angry force stood in front of her.
"Logan?" She kept her tone light as she turned her full attention to his face, making sure she didn't flinch from his snarl.
"Who's is *this*?" In his hand he held a green leather bound book, the pages edged in gold, but as to who's it was she had no clue. Her mouth opened to tell him when a voice rang out across the quiet dining room.
"It's mine, Ah wrote in it," Ororo watched as Logan turned to the sound his anger keeping him from recognising who's voice it was until he snapped his gaze to the doorway. As soon as he saw Marie stood there his anger disappated and a look of deep sorrow replaced it. His hand still gripped the green book but now he was moving toward the answer he'd sought from Ororo.
Ro' watched as Logan stood just a few feet from Rogue, the young woman looking so distraught and vulnerable. Rogue just turned her back on the rest of the room leading Logan away back into the house. Seeing the rest of the room still watching the doorway Ro' cleared her throat addressing the entire room. "Dinner isn't over and you all have rota's to get to afterward, so I suggest you get to finishing your food before you think about doing anyhting else." The room was still quiet but the undercurrent had been changed by the arrival of the ghost of the mansion. Maybe now something would change for the better, Ro' had noticed Rogues withdrawl but she'd been too busy to deal with it. What better to get Logan back into the swing of things than letting him deal with her. Thing was if she'd taken a look at the contents of the book she'd have had a different take on things entirely.
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Marie's heart felt like it was going to explode, Logan was following her, she could feel his entire body humming with tension. Every step he took made the ground under her feet reverberate, making her nerves jangle. She was heading for the main library room, knowing that it'd be empty for the rest of the night. After all she did the rota's for the cleaning and she'd left this place out of the rota. It gave her a place to run to if she needed it and she needed it now.
Opening the door wide she let the door take her all the way in, holding it open for Logan to follow her. He did and she didn't look at him as she closed it behind him, flicking the lock home and securing it from the rest of the house. She didn't want anyone else to know what they'd be talking about, because if they did catch on it'd be the end for both of them.
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He'd showered, cleaned his room, dropped his washing down the chute to the laundry and he'd been getting his stuff out of the duffle when he'd knocked the book open. The page he'd seen was covered in neat rounded handwriting, balanced and even. Thing was it had been *his* handwriting, even as his eyes scanned the page he knew the event that was being described to him. It had been a cage match that had gone wrong, he'd been found out, that he was a mutant. That he healed as soon as the damage was done to him, he was cheating and no man human or mutant cheated twice.
He'd killed the entire bar, sixty people in total, sliced, cut, let his animal loose and enjoyed every single goddamn minute of it. He'd stolen the cash on the bodies, searched for anything of value and come up with several things that even Wheels hadn't found out about. Afterward he'd torched the place, made it look like a propane explosion, no one questioned it. Tragedies like that one were two a penny out in the sticks, unlicensed propane traders didn't hook things up properly and this was just another bad luck story.
Yet here it all was in black and white and in his *own* hand, all he'd thought was that Wheels had done it to him and made him forget it again. All he'd wanted to know was who'd been holding it, it had never occured to him that someone else had written it. Seeing Marie stood there, her face haunted and drawn he knew who had written it all. He'd flicked through the rest of the book, it described the weaknesses of the school, of the teams, the ways she/he could take them down. It spoke of rage, anger, hatred so complete he was amazed she wasn't in a straight jacket. There was even a dream of his he wasn't so pleased about in there, after he's stabbed her in the chest he'd been troubled by a dream of her. Of her coming in to see him, of him stabbing her and no one coming to help. Thing was he'd been happy about her death and what he'd done to her as she died made him hate the animal that lay hidden inside him. Yet every detail was there and in her own handwriting she'd put a 'WHY?' next to it. Along with a 'does he really hate me this much?', the book was a log of his darkness and now he knew where it had gone and he couldn't heal her with his touch anymore. She was human, as much as she could be with this stuff in her mind.
He watched as she walked to the chairs in front of the late autumn sun streaming through the windows. He still held the book in his hand as he followed her to the seats. She curled herself into one and held herself tight as her gaze watched for his reaction to the book she'd given him. When they'd been there for a few minutes in silence he knew she wasn't going to start without him helping her. Keeping his gaze clear and his body language open he spoke to the woman he'd thought was doing okay without him.
"How?" He dropped the book between them on the floor, it's cover reflecting the golden light of the evening. Her eyes roving over the cover where she'd held it in tight embrace as she'd poured out what she'd needed to.
"Ah'm not sure anymore, it started a little over three months ago. Just odd things, little things like making sure Ah'd locked mah door." Her eyes glassed over as she kept her gaze locked on the green leather, it was easier if she didn't look at him.
"Ah began to get headaches, bad ones. So bad Ah blacked out but Ah woke up an found mah journal covered in writing Ah didn't write. At first Ah didn't realise what it was, then Ah understood it. Tryin not to do somethin' when ya mind is forcin' ya to makes it hurt, so Ah just did what it wanted me to do."
She finally looked up to see Logan's eyes boring into her face, his nostrils flared as if to sense if she was lying. Her fear abated a little when he sat back from her, sensing her truthfulness. He was digesting what she'd told him when she dropped her other bombshell on him.
"Your not the only one Ah'm writin about. Ah've got Erik an the three boys as well." Her eyes finally gave in to the tears that had been threatening to spill for weeks. To finally lay it out in front of someone, to tell her secret to someone who might understand her without calling her mad or insane. She was supposed to be human, the cure was supposed to have stopped her mutation but all it seemed to have done was turn it inward. Instead of hurting others with her touch it'd opened every memory she'd ever taken from those who'd touched her. Filling her until she had to spill it out of herself in some way, every evil secret, every emotion, every passion flowed out of her onto the pages. Their needs needing to be expressed through her actions until they were spent and free of her touch. As if purging them onto the paper lessened their hold on her mind, leaving her trapped in a cycle of other personalities expressions and thoughts.
When she looked up Logan's face was set and his eyes glittered dangerously, she knew she'd seen things about him he'd never wanted anyone to know about never mind write about and feel. When he spoke she could feel the air around them cool to artic ice.
"So what now?"
"They're your thought's Logan, Ah never read em' just wrote em down, like emptyin' a glass. Your thoughts were always green to me, so Ah picked a green book for yours. Do what ya want Logan, Ah don't have the strength anymore to care."
Logan watched as the tears ran down her face, the thin skin stretched over her face, she was thinner than he remembered. Muscle mass had been digested by her body, there wasn't any fat left to burn on her, even her hair was dull,the white in it looking dirty grey to his eyes. She really didn't care anymore, she was at her end, Ro' wasn't looking at her because Marie didn't make a fuss. She just kept going until she dropped dead, something they'd shared personality wise before he'd left. Yet now that spark was missing, it had been quashed, exstinguished by what she was struggling with.
"Does anyone else know?" Her head shook from side to side, tears sliding down her chin and dropping to her knees. He looked at her, she was still dressed in the stuff she used to wear when she was untouchable, shit she even wore gloves still. Then it hit him, if she was trying to get rid of the stuff in her head that was from the touches she'd had so far, she'd be even more unsure of touching anyone else. Even though she'd taken the 'cure', if it had done this to her what else could it do?
The sudden lonliness of her situation hit him, he'd been busy, lost in the school, in his own world of hurt and pain about Jean. He hadn't looked her way at all, thinking she'd be happy with Bobby now she could be touched. Looks like that was a lie as well, he decided to broach the subject with her as she silently began rocking back and forth on the chair in front of him. The sight something that caused bells to ring deep inside his mind. Moving closer to her, getting up from his seat and kneeling in front of her as the sun went down, seeing her gaze lost to the sunlight as the tears rolled down her skin.
"Marie? Marie, you in there?" She didn't respond to his words, she didn't even move when he stopped her rocking. She'd held on until he'd come home, but now she was broken, smashed into pieces by the minds that weren't her own, his own included in there. Guilt landed heavily in his heart as he plucked her into his embrace, the thin body he could feel under his fingers cutting him to the metal of his bones.
His voice rich with emotion as he let himself hold her to him, the promise he made her laying over his shoulders. She'd needed him and he'd been away....again.
"I'm here Marie, I'll look after you I promise. We'll find a way out for you, a way to get well again, even if I have to dig that bitch back up." He felt her skin against his own and noticed how rough and dry it was, the first time he'd touched her her skin had been cold but it had been plump, young and lithe. She felt like a corpse and he'd touched enough of them to know what they felt like. Crying into her hair he let the sun paint them red, covering them in the rich colour of life, knowing it would take more than a few days to get her well again.
His eyes went to the book on the floor, everything he was hiding was in there and she hadn't read it, just let it pour from her into the pages. Reaching out for it he dropped it into her lap and her grip recognised the shape. Hugging it to her he carried her to the doors and out of the library, upstairs to his room where she'd be staying. He helped to cause this mess and no one else had even noticed her despair, all that mattered to him was her. Ro' had coped without him and until Marie was herself again she'd carry on doing it. He had his purpose and he wouldn't give up on her.
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He sat with her asleep on his bed,the four books lined up on the desk in front of him. He'd read his own cover to cover, there were things in there that he'd forgotten or blocked out of his memory. Although they'd given him some new directions to look in to go after the men who'd made him into what he was.
Magneto's book was a nightmare, the words in it filled with such harrowing thoughts and fear that he wondered how the hell she'd been managing to function. The thing that probably saved her was that she wrote in German, he didn't realise he could read it until he'd been five pages in. The language not being a problem to him as he'd read the memories that had been plaguing her waking life. Now he knew why she avoided dinner, taking only what she barely needed to live, she was re-living his days in the camp. Unknowingly she was making herself a thing not worth touching or knowing, the voice in the book was one of a scared child, afraid to eat more than his share. A coldness was already visable in the words, a defiance not to give in, to prove he was better than those who had stolen him from his home. The roots of Magneto were here and he was dragging Marie down with him.
The other book was an amalgam of three personalities, there was one page that stood out against the rest and it made his blood boil. It had been Bobby's mind, Marie's own handwriting was in the margins of this one and it told him more than he'd ever wanted to know about the boy. It described the thoughts he'd been having when he'd come home and Marie had met him in the lobby. Bobby had been just about to kiss her when she'd run off to meet him. Bobby's thoughts had been about getting her to finally let him touch her, when he'd turned to thinking about turning Logan from her and onto Dr Grey. Because to his mind Logan was after Rogue and he didn't want to be second best in anyone's eyes. Besides he'd already told everyone he'd get her cherry before her birthday and he didn't want Logan's appearance to mess that up.
In the margins had been Marie's take on his thoughts, her words told him of her hurt, the depth of the pain that she'd felt. That she was only something to mark off on a post, that she'd had no other worth than her virginity. He'd looked for the handwriting that marked Bobby's thoughts and found them to be mainly about his standing with the rest of his friends. How much he was being lauded for being the boyfriend of the 'untouchable' girl and how much they wanted to know about her. Did she let him touch her up outside her clothes, was he frightened of her? There were a couple of entries where Marie had tried to erase what on there, but he'd just photocopied it and then used a scanner to bring the words up. What he'd read had made him shred the chairs in the room but it was better than doing it to Bobby.
He'd given the real reason for being with her, his mind had revealed it to her. Pity. He pitied her, thought he could give her something from the popular kids, make her one of them. Make her fit in for a while and when he'd 'fixed' her he'd move on to someone else, someone with a better mutation, a cooler mutation like his.
Yet it had been her own diary that had let him see her breakdown in detail. The ways she'd tried to cope, the little things she'd excused herself for while still being part of the team. People had noticed how she was being a little different but she'd just told them she was studying tactics. She had been but her teachers hadn't been in the flesh, him and Erik had been showing her how to find weaknesses in body and soul. How to exploit them to her advantage, she even told him how she'd found herself with knife in hand about to drive it into Bobby's skull as he slept in the rec room. She'd run into the woods and kept running until she'd been exhausted. The anger about his treatment of her finding a willing instructor in both his own personality and Erik's.
Withdrawing a little at a time but holding on, keeping her sanity until she could get someone to explain it to her. To tell her why, show her why it was happening to her, she was supposed to be cured now. It was here he'd read her thoughts about why it happened like this. That her mutation was being suppressed and so it was making her purge everything she'd ever taken in. The suppression could end but it might carry on until she died. She had so many memories from so many people as well as her own.
Even here she knew that the only person who might understand was him, but would he help her? Would he stop what he was doing to help her again? Now she was human, now she'd shown him where her loyalty had lain and it hadn't been with him or the X-Men but herself? Her doubts were loud in his ears but she'd risked it all on him and he was in no doubt that if he'd reacted badly to the book she'd handed to him she'd have been dead by now.
Tearing his gaze away from the four books he took the green one in hand and put it in his duffle. The rest were hers to keep, but that was his, anything else she wanted to write she'd have to talk about with him. It was the only thing he could do, he wasn't a telepath he couldn't get in her head and he doubted that it'd do any good anyway. She needed someone with her as she went through this and if it took the rest of her life to sort out at least she wouldn't do it alone.
Walking over to the bed he wrapped himself around her pulling her into his embrace, resting his chin on her head. Breathing her in and scenting that she was actually sleeping well for the first time in months. For now the world outside would wait, he had everything he had to do right here.
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Epilogue
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It didn't take months, it took years, just under five to be honest. In all that time he never left her side,never fought on missions, never left the grounds unless she was with him. He was constant, a rock she needed to rely on, a touchstone, someone she could run to when the memories overwhelmed her. He was the legend of her map of the world,it was him she looked to, to tell her if what she was doing was her or not.
In time her mutation returned, the cure fading as her body replaced the cells it had been in, re-writing the genome of a mutant had been harder than anyone had predicted and as such mutants who had been 'cured' were finding they were no such thing. All they had done was delay their progress, a bip on the chart for human development. Mutants were here to stay and nothing could stop their advance.
For Marie it meant that the memories weakened, their hold over her mind lessened, their grip over her behaviour fading until all that was left of them were the scars of her own imposed exile. She had to come to terms with knowing what she knew about the people around her, as the memories weakened it was as if she absorbed the personalities again. Giving them a piece of her inner landscape to live in, making it easier for her to find the control of her mutation. Each face she knew gave her control over their powers as well as her own, her potential was reached and no one knew but her and Logan.
The school was a place to heal in, it wasn't the place to 'live'. It had been an unspoken agreement since the first morning she'd woken up in Logan's room, as soon as she was herself again they'd be going. He'd put his search on hold for her and she owed him time, maybe once they had the answers they both sought they'd consider coming back. But not now. They left quietly, in the late evening sun of autumn, the light painting them red, the colour of life, rich and vibrant.
As with any map you need a legend to read it by, Marie's had come to find her now it was her turn to help Logan find his.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Just a small fic that popped into existance, hope you enjoy it.